Optical brightener

Thank you for helping us expand this topic!
Simply begin typing or use the editing tools above to add to this article.
Once you are finished and click submit, your modifications will be sent to our editors for review.

Ads by Google

This topic is discussed in the following articles:

textile finishing

Optical brightening, or optical bleaches, are finishes giving the effect of great whiteness and brightness because of the way in which they reflect light. These compounds contain fluorescent colourless dyes, causing more blue light to be reflected. Changes in colour may occur as the fluorescent material loses energy, but new optical whiteners can be applied during the laundering process.

washing powders

Now an integral part of all washing powders,
optical brighteners are dyestuffs absorbed by textile fibres from solution but not subsequently removed in rinsing. They convert invisible ultraviolet light into visible light on the blue side of the spectrum, causing the fibre to reflect a greater proportion of visible light and making it appear brighter. Furthermore, since the tone of the extra...

Click anywhere inside the article to add text or insert superscripts, subscripts, and special characters.
You can also highlight a section and use the tools in this bar to modify existing content:

Add links to related Britannica articles!
You can double-click any word or highlight a word or phrase in the text below and then select an article from the search box.
Or, simply highlight a word or phrase in the article, then enter the article name or term you'd like to link to in the search box below, and select from the list of results.

Note: we do not allow links to external resources in editor.
Please click the Web sites link for this article to add citations for
external Web sites.